“Then,” asked Croesus angrily, “do you not reckon me at all among happy men?” Solon, who did not wish to flatter him, nor yet to exasperate him farther, answered, “O King of the Lydians, we Greeks have been endowed with moderate gifts, by Heaven, and our wisdom is of a cautious and homely cast, not of a royal and magnificent character; so, being moderate itself, and seeing the manifold chances to which life is exposed, it does not permit us to take a pride in our present possessions, nor to admire the good fortune of any man when it is liable to change.  Strange things await every man in the unknown future; and we think that man alone happy whose life has been brought to a fortunate termination.  To congratulate a man who is yet alive and exposed to the caprice of fortune is like proclaiming and crowning as victor one who has not yet run his race, for his good fortune is uncertain and liable to reversal.”  After speaking thus, Solon took his leave, having enraged Croesus, who could not take his good advice.

XXVIII.  Aesop, the writer of the fables, who had been sent for to Sardis by Croesus and enjoyed his favour, was vexed at the king’s ungracious reception of Solon, and advised him thus:  “Solon,” said he, “one ought either to say very little to kings or else say what they wish most to hear.”  “Not so,” said Solon; “one should either say very little to them, or else say what is best for them to hear.”  So at that time Croesus despised Solon; but after he had been defeated by Cyrus, his city taken, and he himself was about to be burned alive upon a pyre erected in the presence of all the Persians and of Cyrus himself, then he thrice cried out, “Solon,” as loud as he could.  Cyrus, surprised at this, sent to ask what man or god Solon might be, who was invoked by a man in such extremity.  Croesus, without any concealment said, “He is one of the wise men of Greece, whom I sent for, not because I wished to listen to him and learn what I was ignorant of, but in order that he might see and tell of my wealth, which I find it is a greater misfortune to lose than it was a blessing to possess.  For, while I possessed it, all I enjoyed was opinion and empty talk; whereas, now the loss of it has brought me in very deed into terrible and irreparable misfortunes and sufferings.  Now this man, who foresaw what might befall me, bade me look to the end of my life, and not be arrogant on the strength of a fleeting prosperity.”

When this was reported to Cyrus, he being a wiser man than Croesus, and finding Solon’s words strongly borne out by the example before him, not only released Croesus, but treated him with favour for the rest of his life; so that Solon had the glory of having by the same words saved one king’s life and given instruction to another.